This invention relates to a granular, free-flowing, non-caking sugar incorporated product. More specifically, this invention relates to a crystallized and readily water-dispersible sugar incorporated product and to a method for producing the sugar incorporated product.
Many food ingredients are sold by the food industry in powder or granular form. For example, gums, gelatin, emulsifiers, starches, cocoa and flavorants, which are used as thickening, stabilizing, gelling, coloring and flavoring agents in food products, are sold in powder form.
Food ingredients which are used in powdered form are not totally satisfactory. Because of their high affinity for water, these powdered food ingredients are not readily dispersed in water. The granules tend to clump together and float on the surface when they are mixed with liquids. In general, vigorous agitation while heating is needed to dissolve or disperse powdered food ingredients in liquids.
Other problems also exist with powdered food ingredients. Powdered food ingredients have a tendency to cake upon standing and an additive is needed to prevent this. Powdered food ingredients are mechanically blended. It is difficult to obtain a uniform blend of the powdered food ingredients because they separate or settle out upon standing. Consequently, in order to use the correct proportions of ingredients in a package, the consumer must use the entire package rather than just a part of the package. Another problem is that a percentage of the blend components is lost as dust during mechanical blending.
"Instant" food products, that is, powdered food products which contain all of the food ingredients in a single package, encounter the same problems of difficulty of dispersion, tendency to cake, tendency to settle out, and dust losses.
It would be desirable to produce powdered food ingredients which avoid these problems.
It would also be desirable to produce instant food products which avoid these problems.
In the manufacture of sugar products, a process known as the transforming process is used to convert a sugar syrup into a dry sugar product. The sugar product is granular, free-flowing, non-caking, and is readily dispersed or dissolved in water. The transforming process has been described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,149,682 (Tippens et al.), 3,365,331 (Miller et al.), 4,159,210 (Chen et al.), and our copending, co-assigned application entitled "Crystallized, Readily Water-Dispersible Sugar Product Containing Heat Sensitive, Acidic or High Invert Sugar Substances." In Tippens et al., the method comprises concentrating a sugar syrup to a solids content of about 95-97% by heating the sugar syrup to a temperature of about 250.degree.-265.degree. F., and subjecting the resulting supersaturated sugar syrup to a heat dissipation operation simultaneously with vigorous agitation. The method produces a dry sugar product comprising aggregates of fondant-size (3-50 microns) sucrose crystals. Miller et al. describes a similar process in which impact beating is used to crystallize the sugar product from the supersaturated sugar syrup.
The feed syrup which is employed in the processes of Tippens et al. and Miller et al. has a purity in the range of 85-97% by weight sucrose. Thus, the feed syrup may not contain more than about 15% by weight non-sucrose solids.
Both Tippens et al. and Miller et al. disclose that sugar products prepared in accordance with their invention are useful as carriers for additive materials which may have a food value or a taste value or a color value or medicinal value or the like. The food additive may be added at any step in the process, such as during concentration, crystallization, comminution, screening, or by a separate blending and mixing operation with the sugar product, depending on the nature of the additive material.
Theoretically, it is possible to adapt the sugar transforming process so that a food ingredient is crystallized with the sucrose crystals from a sugar syrup containing the food ingredient. The resulting product would be granular, homogeneous, dry, free-flowing and non-caking. In addition, because the structure of the product would be porous clusters of micro-sized sucrose crystals intimately associated with the food ingredient, the food ingredient would be readily dispersible or dissolvable in liquid.
Accordingly it is an object of this invention to provide a product which incorporates a food ingredient into a crystalline sugar matrix.
It is also an object of this invention to provide this sugar product in dry, granular, free-flowing, non-caking form.
It is also an object of this invention to provide this sugar product in a form in which the food ingredient is readily dispersed or dissolved in liquid.
it is also an object of this invention to provide a sugar product which contains all of the dry food ingredients needed to make a final food product.
It is also an object of this invention to provide a method for preparing this sugar product.
These and other objects are accomplished by means of the present invention described below.